Alfred Hitchcock is the man! The movie starts off in Arizona with Marion ( Janet Leigh), and Sam (John Gavin) making out on the bed in a hotel room. Sam is as broke as a piece of glass, so a hot fling is all he's good for at the moment. A couple of hours later, Marion goes to work (I'm assuming in a real estate office), and a rich guy comes in, flashes $40,000 in her face for his daughter's new home, and lets her know "There is more where that came from."
Marion just smiles and nods, fakes a headache, and runs off with the money.
You know, I really like this lady, I should look her number up in the Arizona phone book, and ask if we can be friends. Think about it, she has two options at this point. Marion could go out with Rich Guy for months, tolerate his bad jokes, crappy personality and lousy lovemaking techniques, just to get her hands on his cash, credit cards, and checkbook. Why deal with that when you can just cut to the chase and run off with the 40 thou that is dumped right in front of you?
Marion drives to California, pulls to the side of the road to catch some zzzz' s when Mr. Police Officer shows up. He asks her some questions, all the while she has the words GUILTY AS SIN plastered all over her face. The cop is suspicious, follows her into town and watch as she trades her car in for one with California plates. Okay, now she's driving again, thinking of all the dumb stuff that might be said about her on Monday when everyone finds out she's missing along with the 40 thou. It starts raining, she pulls off the main road into the Bates Motel. She meets Nice-looking Norman who is also very polite and cordial. He even offers to fix her something to eat since driving to a diner with be a major pain about now. So Norman goes up to the house, and all of us, including Marion hear this argument between Norman, and his mom who doesn't want strange women hanging around.
Oh well, whatever. Norman is back with dinner. Okay, what do we have here, it.
......looks.......like.......a couple pieces of bread......... and some peanut butter? Norman, YOU AND YOUR MOM HAVE LOUSY HOSPITALITY SKILLS! An attractive woman stops by your motel, hungry as I don't know what, and the best you can offer her is a kiddie sandwich? What you need to do is tell mom to get lost, get in that kitchen, and broil a couple of Rib Eyes with a baked potato on the side! Better yet, call the nearest Chinese Food Restaurant, and have them bring over some Egg Foo Young, and Shrimp with Lobster Sauce right away! If Marion doesn't eat it, call me up, and I'll be on the next flight out there! Oh wait, if I do that, I might not make it back home, so forget it.
So now Marion's eating, while Norman talks about dumb stuff, then she's off to bed-alone thank you! Norm sneaks a peek at her through a small hole in the wall, goes up to his house, and now we have the famous shower scene. To sum it up, Marion takes a shower, mom comes in with knife, slashes her along with scary movie playing, leaves, and Marion dies. I wonder how they got her to lie still like that without blinking? Norm comes rushing in, shocked to see what has happened, and spends a least twenty minutes of my precious viewing time disposing of Marion's body, and cleaning up the scene of the crime.
While this was going on, I was able to wash some dishes, and make a quick phone call.
Several days later, Marion's sister Lila (Vera Miles), shows up in California at Sam's place at work asking questions when a detective (Martin Balsam) also walks in demanding answers. Now see, I like Lila. She's tough, strong willed, and determined, in contrast to the nosy, and irritating detective who gets paid to be that way. Let me give you an example. Next scene, Nosy Detective finds his way to the Bates Motel, runs into Norm, and starts asking him uncomfortable, and intrusive questions while trying to find out about Marion.
Then he sneaks into the Bates house without so much as an invitation.
Detective, I don't like you very much. That's why Norm's mom did a number on your face and you fell down the stairs, Mr. A-R-B-O-G-A-S-T, or whatever your name is.
Meanwhile, Lila and Sam get worried, Sam takes a trip out to the motel looking for the now dead detective, Sam comes back and goes to the sheriff's house with Lila, but don't find out anything. The next day, Sam and Lila plot to go out to the Bates Hotel, check in as man and wife, and search the place.
Then Sam gets the hero bug, and decides to confront Norm about Marion and the 40 thou. Sam, you really got off easy in this movie. Be glad that you only suffered a blow to the back of your head, because Norm could have easily pulled out a Beretta 80, and blew your head off for getting on his nerves.
The conclusion? Lila sneaks into the house looking for the Mom, finds a corpse, in runs Norm dressed in his mom's outfit, ready to kill Lila who is then saved by Sam. So we find out that Norm killed his mom (and other women along the way) sometime back and took over her personality and voice while trying to keep his own. Hey Norm, I have one question for you, how are you able to sound just like an 80 year old woman? Did you take Ventriloquist or voice-over classes or something? Can you teach me how to do that too?
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